A Mystery or the Cause of a Vampire's Misery
by GreenTea4062
Summary: Charlie Swan used to have many shinobi from Konoha to stay at his place. Until it stopped due to the circumstances in Konoha not allowing any shinobi capable of fighting 'out for vacation'. Well, it started again now that a redhead shinobi ― or kunoichi ― by the name of Naruto Uzumaki came suddenly into his life. (Fem!Naruto/Edward)
1. Arrival

Waist long red hair blowing freely by the winds, the birds around the neighborhood chirping quite loudly. Her blue eyes watching the distance, taking in the beautiful, yet strange scenery of this neighborhood.

As the winds grew stronger, she huddled her orange collared white jacket, a gift from Sasuke, closer. Although she wore a sweater underneath the jacket, the chilling winter winds of this town were enough for her bones to feel it.

"Naruto Uzumaki?"

Her name was uttered with a heavy accent that made it her flinch because it didn't sound like her name. However, she didn't really mind. Really, she didn't expect everyone here to be able to pronounce her name correctly, since they didn't speak the shinobi world's language. This was America, a foreign country and a different language was spoken here. She better get used to this.

Because whether she liked it or not, she didn't really have a choice.

"Yes, that's me," she let out a small smile. "You're Charlie Swan?" she gripped her backpack tightly, purposely letting the man saw how nervous she was to be here.

The man ushered his hand towards his house, "Come in."

Charlie led her to his house, indicating that it's okay to come in. Sakura-chan warned her to not step out of boundaries and some stuff about etiquettes that she didn't bother to pay attention to. Well, she didn't exactly want to come off as 'that rude foreigner', so she watched the man's body language and all ― something she learned from a crash course on 'how to be a proper kunoichi'.

Naruto trudged the wet pavements, the small stairs to get inside. Following Charlie, she watched the surroundings around the house with fascination. All of the houses were far away from each house, unlike in Konoha where a house can share a wall with its neighbour's.

Once inside, she took in the foreign design. Gingerly, she smelled the house. The after rain scent was lingering heavily in the house, she noted with faint interest. Konoha didn't rain unless it was the fall season. Probably because this town was the rainiest town in the whole US, or so Kakashi-sensei had said.

She gazed at the comfortable-looking couch in the middle of the room, and there she went, sitting without being permitted to.

"I'm surprised that you're coming here with a short notice," Charlie commented after she sat on the couch.

Naruto let out a small gasp of amazement that the seal on the bracelet around her wrist was able to make her understand English. It was working too perfectly, in fact. Her father's genius knew no bounds, indeed.

She stared down and said with an accented English, "I am, too."

Charlie Swan used to have many shinobi from Konoha to stay in his place, until it stopped five years ago due to the circumstances in Konoha not allowing any shinobi capable of fighting out 'for vacation'. It was after Orochimaru abandoned Konoha that made Konoha made the entrance to this different world a top secret and then the Invasion set by Orochimaru ― that killed the Sandaime ― made Konoha sent a notice to Charlie Swan that they will stop sending shinobi to stay for indefinite amount of time.

After a portal connecting this world and the shinobi world was made accidentally by Namikaze Minato, in about twenty years ago, Minato became friend with Charlie, who kindly hosted the man who was temporarily stranded in an unknown world.

Seeing how different Charlie's world was, her father had stayed a few days or even weeks here to take a break from the war back home. Intrigued with this 'different world', her father requested Charlie to shelter in some men and women from Konoha that needed to take a fresh air.

From then on, Charlie Swan had became the 'ambassador' for this world. Ever since Minato told his friends and acquaintances about the 'other world', a waiting-list was made for them who want to experience the 'new world'.

Some agreements were made in the past and now here she was, able to stroll in this world with ease. The portal was placed by Minato near the Hokage Mountain and Kakashi-sensei had made it to make her appear right in front of Charlie's house. No one would notice, but even if someone happened of seeing her appearing out of nowhere, that someone would probably take it as an imagination, anyways.

This world didn't have chakra, after all. This world was essentially filled with civilians that hadn't had a slightest idea of how powerful one can be with the energy called 'chakra', so the idea that someone could teleport from one world to another might have be taken as 'fictional'.

Huffing at her thoughts, she let out a low growl. Her moods were the worse now with her unwanted 'monthly bleeding' starting two days ago. And Naruto herself still hadn't come to terms that her father used to come here before she was born, probably planning the seal that made her confused and out of her mind for the last few months. Coming here was kind of her choice yet not exactly, and that was why she inhaled deeply to try to calm herself and not scaring Charlie out on her first day.

Yet, the fact that she was all but shoved here, ordered to come here to 'heal' her mind that she let the confusion turn into anger.

Screw them. She will be here, in this world, for a few years. Whether they wanted it or not.

Yes, it offended her that Kakashi-sensei was too busy to notice her 'gender-changing' problems. It definitely hurt her that her friends didn't understand where she was coming from whenever she used henge when they were around. It made her blood boil that her best friend, Sasuke, was uncomfortable whenever she visited his cell. It made her mad that Konoha government thought they can control her even after she had saved the world from a literal mad goddess.

But most of all, she felt like a dirt whenever Hinata threw her conflicted looks. Or whenever Sakura-chan jokingly said that she will be supportive of 'SasuNaru' or some crap like that.

 _ **Calm down. I'm sure Tsunade only has a good reason for you to stay here.**_

Kurama's booming voice in the back of her mind startled her, but it didn't stop her rage.

 _You mean that she can't handle me withering away in my apartment that she used her last resort and sent me here without discussing it with me first? Without my consent? Yeah, this is my choice, but did she have to make Sakura-chan force-feeding the idea of this maybe-fake, peaceful world into me that I said I was considering the idea of coming here?_ she sarcastically responded to Kurama.

 _ **Naruto...**_

It didn't end there. She continued her rant, _A long-term easy_ _mission, my butt. They just want me to come back to 'normal'. Considering that the few 'mentally-ill but powerful' shinobi that had came here, came back to Konoha looking, behaving, and speaking normally, they just want a chakra monster like me to behave,_ Kurama didn't make a comeback, making her snort within her mind with a disdain, _I'm right, then? Well, for once, I'm not glad about that, but thanks for the silence, Kurama._

Satisfying that she could think clearly now, she stood up from the couch. Taking out the blue bracelet on her left hand, she pocketed the bracelet to her trouser's pocket. She asked in a slow, accented English, "Where is the room that I would stay in?"

Charlie's eyebrows shot up with surprise at her action. It was rare for the shinobi people to daringly speak to him without the bracelet, especially on the first day. He would understand her language only because of the red wrist band on his right hand, but he appreciated her efforts in learning English.

He shot her a small smile, "It's upstairs," he answered slowly, letting her slowly comprehend English without the 'magic bracelet'. So far, out of the many people that he had hosted, only Minato could speak English with a level of fluency of a native. Somehow, he got the feeling that the girl will be able to reach that level, too.

She knew that learning spoken English without the bracelet would be a difficult task, but she didn't mind the challenge. She would grasp the language sooner or later.

Well, it was just like she didn't mind the fact that she was a girl all along.

Her father was a genius, but he ruined her image of herself with his ingenious seal that had made her a boy until a few months ago. For her protection, he said that last time she met him. If she could, she would gut him in the stomach now ― like the first time they had met.

"That bedroom is Bella's, my daughter," Charlie interrupted her thoughts, pointing to the bedroom across to what she assumed the 'guest bedroom turned into her temporary bedroom', "and this will be yours," he said as he turned the knob.

The room was painted white. A bed with a plain white cover on the middle, a closet on the corner of the room, near the door. It was nice change, in her opinion.

"Oh, and the bathroom is downstairs."

She just had to place a hiraishin marking on the bathroom's door surface, then. "Right."

"This is all for today. Well, supper will be Pizza, if that's okay with you?"

Naruto gave a nod even though she didn't know what a Pizza was.

Seeing that he still had the wrist band that enabled the man to understand her language, she asked, "Do I have to enroll in to a school if I wanted to stay here for a long time?"

Charlie raised his eyebrow and inquired, "Define 'a long time'."

Not mulling it over, she just said, "Um, somewhere from three to five years?"

Charlie was fast to response, "If you wanted to go to the public and all, the answer is 'yes'."

It wasn't like she wanted to abandon her home ― Konoha ― but she just wanted to stay away from there, longer than one year, at least. "Hmm," she voiced out, "can you enroll me into the nearby school?" she hurriedly added, "I have gold ― "

"None of that," Charlie held his hands out, uncomfortable, "I know people who can make fake papers for you ― for free. I'm a Policeman but I'm not quite strict ― after all, I know your circumstances."

She smiled weakly ― sincere and thankful, but didn't have the strength to make it known. She was glad that he didn't try to pry for her reasons for staying here quite longer than anyone that had been staying here.

"Thank you, Charlie-occhan," she uttered.

Naruto currently was an emotional roller coaster, but she had a passing thought that she was glad that she didn't have a breakdown in front of this kind man.

"No problem, kiddo," he said, with an easy shrug. "Your world's language greatly resembles Japanese, so you will be answering that you're from Japan whenever someone asks you: 'where are you from', all right?" at her nod, Charlie let out a brief smile, "See you later."

And then he descended downstairs.

Doozing off in the hallway for a minute, her brain was fried from hearing English without the bracelet. She soon entered her bedroom after she snapped out of it. She shut the door close with a soft click. As it was quite warm inside, she quickly got rid of her jacket and sweater. Naruto hung them inside the closet.

Making her way towards the bed, she placed her backpack ― filled with storage scrolls ― near the edge of her bed, for her to easily reach it. Letting herself fall on to the bed, she softly sighed at the strange, but comfy feel of it.

After a while of hearing only the sounds of the clock hung to the wall, Naruto let it lull herself to sleep.

* * *

 **Note: Don't ask me. Just don't. Well, I did ask myself of why am I writing this even though I don't plan to write this... but I don't have an answer. Where the heck did this idea come from? I don't know, and because of that; don't ask. Just pardon my English, please, because I'm not a native speaker. If you can, leave your thoughts about this fic, because I definitely am want to know if this fic was okay or not.**

 **Update: Lol. I just got my first hate comment from this fic. Is this an achievement or something? But, well, I deleted it. Because, honestly, it makes me uncomfortable. And the fact that the review is made by an unanimous helped too. So here to commemorate it *ehem*.**


	2. School

"It's okay, Occhan," Naruto reassured, "I like walking."

"Are you really sure? You can use Bella's truck after you get your license ― "

"Oh, no, no," Naruto held up her hand, "The truck will be her gift when she'll move here in January, right? Moreover, I don't need it. I can always teleport to school."

Charlie still looked troubled, a slight frown marred his face, but he let the matter slide. "If that's what you want," he reluctantly said.

Naruto smiled up at him, "It is."

"At least, let me drive you to school today."

Naruto paused, finding nothing wrong with it. "All right," she gave in, seeing that Charlie had not offered it because he felt obligated, but because he wanted to.

During the month of waiting for Charlie to finish enrolling her to school ― something that she somewhat regretted now ― she locked herself up in her room and crammed English, Geography, trivial things about this world as much as she could into her brain by reading books and listening to music, sometimes conjuring a bunch of Shadow Clones to help her.

She had arrived in this world in August 2004 and would be attending school today, September 2004. Naruto only chose to go to school in this world because she wanted to experience the feeling of being a normal kid ― well, a normal girl. Back home she couldn't because she was... a genin, a hero who saved the world with personal problems she just didn't want everyone to know.

Well, because, everyone knew her back home ― as a boy, even. She had to use henge and plaster a permanent smile whenever she got out of her apartment. Here? Well, she could frown whenever she liked, wore something girly for once, even though she sometimes felt like a boy wearing girly things.

Trying to prepare herself for the undoubtedly English-filled days ahead, she tried not to speak her native language for a month ― even with Kurama, she forced him to learn English with her.

Morning till lunch, she learned all about adjusting to the foreign things in this world. She surfaced the internet, learned how to use a laptop she had bought with her own money ― she exchanged some of the gold she brought from Konoha to American Dollars ― learned that humans in this world could fly by things called Planes and Helicopters. Sometimes, she even made efforts to greet mothers and old ladies alike when she went to the grocery store. In the evening, she made simple ― she quickly got sick with the foreign take-ins ― dinner and watch the television with Charlie and talked about mundane things with him.

All in all, she could picture herself at least surviving in this world with her now mediocre English. She still lost track of what Charlie was saying when he was speaking fast, but she was happy to say that even when he did that, she could understand the gist of what he was saying.

Naruto munched on her breakfast which consisted of cup ramen from Konoha and a toast with blueberry jam. She had tried cereal but found that she couldn't eat it as breakfast. Maybe as a snack but definitely not as a breakfast menu.

"Ready to go?"

"Just a minute!"

Naruto responded. She stuffed the toast she hadn't got the time to eat yet to her mouth and launched her backpack on to her shoulder.

* * *

"Why is everybody staring?" she asked when they arrived. Naruto wasn't shy, but the stares and the whispers were unnerving.

"Dunno about that," Charlie knew why ― it was because he drove her to school with his cruiser ― but didn't want to say it, "Go straight to the Secretary's office to get your schedule. And... well, good luck," he gave her shoulder a brief pat.

Naruto shot him a grin and got off. Once Charlie drove off, she breathed in, drawing her confidence. Her grip on her backpack tightening, she strolled the road confidently, ignoring the curious stares she got from the students that saw her getting off of Charlie's cruiser.

* * *

"You have to get each teacher in your classes today to sign this little slip of paper. Do you understand?"

Naruto nodded at Miss Cope, briefly annoyed at the woman for speaking too slowly. Instead of nursing her annoyance towards the woman, she checked her schedule.

 _English, Mason, Building 3_

 _Trigonometry, Varner, Building 5_

 _American History, Hauss, Building 2_

 _Gym, Clapp, Gym_

 _~Lunch~_

 _Biology II, Banner, Building 4_

 _Spanish, Goff, Building 7_

 _Art, Trelawney, Building 8_

Naruto furrowed her brow. Seven subjects? Compared to the fake Japanese high school academic reports Charlie's acquaintance had made, her junior year academic report would be a complete disaster, that's for sure. She could almost see it.

Sighing internally, she sent her fakest, widest smile to the person behind the desk, "Thank you, Miss Cope."

Walking while looking at the map to know where building three was, she thought about the subjects. She feared her second class because she didn't even know what Trigonometry was about. But the rest of the subjects were something she did know ― even for a little.

She had chose Spanish because the sounds were close to her native language. History would probably lull her to sleep ― like the clock sounds in her room always did. Well, at least she looked forward to English. Gym? Nah, she didn't look forward to downplaying her physical strength.


End file.
